Thursday, February 21, 2013

Dr. Richard Mollica of Harvard Medical School once explained
that: “The best cure for depression is a job.”

Unfortunately, the therapy culture, and psychoanalysis, in
particular has tricked people into believing that they can cure depression by falling
in love. Since psychoanalysis has touted itself as a cure by love, one is
within one’s rights to assume that it is going to provide a therapeutic
benefit.

By my lights, the second best cure for depression is making
a new friend.

Of course, finding and working at a job will produce a new
group of friends and acquaintances. More than that, when you work a job, you
belong to a group and function according to its rules.

What more can you ask?

However good it feels to fall in love, it does not make you
feel like you belong to a group. Two-person partnerships are not groups.

On Tuesday Elizabeth Bernstein of the Wall Street Journal reported on some of the most recent research
about making friends.

It shouldn’t really come as news, but researchers have discovered
that friendships are best when they develop gradually through a mutual exchange
of information. Saying that this exchange must be balanced is saying that
neither party should overshare or undershare.

Bernstein reports:

"You
want to be slow and reciprocal," says Arthur Aron, professor of psychology
at Stony Brook University, in New York, who developed the protocol. "If
you disclose too much too fast, you put someone off."

Not
sure how to find the sweet spot between disclosing too little and disclosing
too much? Remember how badly you wanted to get off the plane the last time
someone in the next seat downloaded way too much information.

Oversharing
is often seen as one-sided, overwhelming and socially inappropriate, Dr. Aron
says. How can you tell if you are doing it? The other person may seem tense,
fidgety or at a loss for words.

Exactly. Aristotle couldn’t have said it better, though he
did say it first.

If friendship is based on a controlled exchange of
information, then you do not develop a friendship by emulating what Hilary
Mantel called Princess Diana’s “emotional incontinence.” (See yesterday’s post
on Mantel and Kate Middleton.)

It is impossible to follow Dr. Aron’s instructions if you
have no self-control. You cannot follow it if you have difficulty reading
emotional cues, either.

Normally, we believe that it takes time to develop a solid
friendship. Many people believe in love at first sight, but friendship at first
sight… that sounds like a stretch.

So, one is surprised to read that Dr. Aron believes that two
people can become fast friends in 45 minutes.

There, he is both right and wrong. On the one hand it feels
like an equivalent to love at first sight; too good to be true. On the other
hand, we have all had the experience of meeting someone for the first time and feeling
an affinity that grows into a friendship.

Normally, fast friendship depends on finding that you have a
great deal in common. If you see and hear someone who resembles you, you will be more likely
to feel an affinity. Or better, you will feel more trusting. If the other
person is stranger, you will require more proof that he is trustworthy
and that you are both speaking the same language.

Dare I say that someone you know for 45 minutes and for whom
you feel an affinity is not your best friend. Friendship must be earned, over
time. How can you know whether you can trust another individual if your
interactions have never required him to demonstrate trust?

As it happens, Dr. Aron offers some guidance about how to
forge a fast friendship. By his lights, the gradualist approach involves asking
a series of questions that are increasingly intrusive and invasive.

Bernstein reports:

Questions
in the first set are only slightly personal ("Before making a telephone
call, do you ever rehearse what you are going to say?" "When did you
last sing to yourself? To someone else?"). In the second set, they are a
little more personal ("What is your most terrible memory?" "Is
there something that you've dreamed of doing for a long time? Why haven't you
done it?"). The last set is personal ("When did you last cry in front
of another person? By yourself?" "Of all the people in your family,
whose death would you find the most disturbing?"). Each set of questions
also includes a relationship-building exercise ("Tell your partner what
you like about them").

To be fair, these questions were devised as part of a research
project. Yet, I fear that people will read about Dr. Aron’s research and come
away thinking that they can become better friends by interrogating their new
acquaintances.

For my part, I advise people to avoid this technique.
Gradualism in friendship involves respecting boundaries. You are not respecting
a virtual stranger’s privacy when you start asking intimate and personal questions.
Developing a friendship should not feel like being deposed.

Also, you have not advanced your friendship when you have
each confessed your most humiliating experiences. Aristotle stated clearly that
friends see the best in their friends, Dr. Aron’s idea might make you feel like
a card-carrying member of the therapy culture, but it will not make you a better
friend.

Why? If your new friend knows something that would, if it
were divulged, damage your reputation, then you will be trying to maintain good
relations, not because you value the other person’s good character, but because
you are living under a threat.

Dr. Aron’s questions are not just intrusive and invasive;
they all involve feeling. None of them really involves fact. None of them involves
sharing information about the economy, the political scene or the upcoming
pennant.

Perhaps his questions will resonate for women, but they will
draw a blank from most men.

For my part I am persuaded that people will get along better
if they offer before they ask. It is better to start a conversation with a
stranger by offering an opinion about a matter of mutual interest: be it the
weather, the election, the noise at the bar, the ball game or the way the people
at the party are dressed.

Once you have established common ground, you can try to move
to the next level. You do so by sharing a piece of personal information. You
should not blurt out an intimate secret, like how you prepare for telephone
calls or why you prefer mid-afternoon trysts. You do better to share some information about
your life: where you work, where you went to school, where you come from, the
name of your Cocker Spaniel.

If your interlocutor reciprocates by divulging some
information about himself you are both on the same level. If not, you should regroup
and return the conversation to more neutral ground.